Roman commerce
Fashions and trends in historiography and in popular culture have tended to neglect the economic basis of the empire in favor of the lingua franca of Latin and the exploits of the Roman legions.
Plebeians and freedmen held shop or manned stalls at markets, and vast numbers of slaves did most of the hard work.
Probably because of their high proportion in society compared to that in Classical Greece, the reality of runaways, and the Servile Wars and minor uprisings, they gave a distinct flavor to Roman commerce.
The argentarii acted as agents in public or private auctions, kept deposits of money for individuals, cashed cheques (prescriptiones) and served as moneychangers.
At least four other large markets specialized in specific goods such as cattle, wine, fish and herbs and vegetables, but the Roman Forum drew the bulk of the traffic.
[citation needed] By the 1st century, the provinces of the Roman Empire were trading huge volumes of commodities to one another via sea routes.
Some provinces specialized in producing certain types of goods, such as grain in Egypt and North Africa and wine and olive oil in Italy, Hispania, and Greece.
Very exceptionally, as at Berenice, there is evidence of long-distance trade in black pepper, almonds, hazelnuts, stone pine cones, walnuts, coconuts, apricots and peaches besides the more expected figs, raisins and dates.
Before the Punic Wars completely changed the nature of commerce in the Mediterranean, the Republic had important commercial exchanges with Carthage.
[citation needed] Maritime archeology and ancient manuscripts from classical antiquity show evidence of vast Roman commercial fleets.
[citation needed] Continuous Mediterranean "police" protection over several centuries was one of the main factors of success of Roman commerce, given that Roman roads were designed more for feet or hooves – with most land trade moving by pack mule – than for wheels, and could not support the economical transport of goods over long distances.
[6] Staple goods and commodities like cereals for making bread and papyrus scrolls for book production were imported from Ptolemaic Egypt to Italy in a continuous fashion.
The main articles imported from India were spices such as pepper, cardamom, cloves, cinnamon, sandal wood and gems such as pearls, rubies, diamonds, emeralds and ivory.
[10] Pomponius Mela argued for the existence of Northeast Passage through the northward strait out of the Caspian Sea (which in Antiquity was usually thought to be open to Oceanus in the north).
[11] There is suggestive archaeological evidence that Roman traders were present in Southeast Asia, which was roughly mapped out by Ptolemy in his Geography where he labelled the land bordering the Magnus Sinus (i.e., the Gulf of Thailand and South China Sea) as the Sinae.
[13] Their port city of "Cattigara", lying beyond the Golden Chersonese (Malay Peninsula) where a Greek sailor named Alexander allegedly visited, was quite possibly the ancient settlement at Oc Eo, Vietnam, where Roman artefacts from the Antonine period such as medallions from the reigns of Antoninus Pius (r. 138–161) and Marcus Aurelius (r. 161–180) have been found.
On the Mercuralia on May 14, a Roman merchant would do the proper rituals of devotion to Mercury and beseech the god to remove from him and from his belongings the guilt coming from all the cheating he had done to his customers and suppliers.
[22] Senators were still allowed to own and make use of ships under the size restriction, Cato when advising where to build a farm specifically mentions to have it built near an accessible river, road or port to allow transport of goods[23] which is in direct conflict to Livy's assertion that all profit made through trade by a senator was dishonorable.
[25] That is not to say that the acquisition of wealth was not to be desired, Pliny notes that a Roman man should by honorable means acquire a large fortune[26] and Polybius draws a comparison between the attitudes of Carthage and Rome towards profit from trade.
Plutarch describes Cato's involvement in trade in great detail, depicting how he would use a proxy (a freedman by the name of Quintio) to run his business through a group of fifty other men.
[citation needed] The majority of the people of the Roman Empire were living in rural areas, with a small part of the population engaged in commerce being much poorer than the elite.
